The home stretch, the final push, stoppage time; whatever it’s called, it’s both a relief and a sadness. I’m certainly feeling road-weary, but the last few weeks have been filled with wonderful experiences, and it’s hard to imagine the constant freshness of traveling being over. Though there’ll be plenty of changes for the next few months regardless, so I’m not worried about being bored. But that’s all to come (sadly, much like the photos of the things I’ll now describe… they’re there, but sorting is not on my agenda for tonight). Continue reading →

I don’t even want to look at my last posted date. And it’s not like I’ve even been that disconnected, or that busy, really. Tuscany was entirely cut off, but it’s been well over a week since we left there, and still no update. This failure is made even more abject by my inbox cheerfully presenting me with posts from my sister, who has managed to move halfway across* a foreign country and find two jobs and settle into an apartment and also managed to keep up a steady stream of blog posts. And here I am, wandering lazily about and not managing to produce anything. So here’s some excuses, and also a summary.

First, turns out I had bronchitis for a few weeks, which saps a bit of energy. Finally managed a doctor in Florence, and the delicious medicines appear to have done the trick. Speaking of Florence, it was the first stop on our post-Tuscany mini-Italy tour, and it was fantastic. The central cathedral is one of the few magnificent buildings that I’ve seen that I’m confident I will never forget. It’s grand and beautiful, and you only realize how huge it is when you see it looming at you in the spaces between the buildings on every narrow street. Or when you climb up it. Beyond that, Florence is lovely, ringed by greenery and filled with wonderful old buildings and bridges.

From there it was off to Rome, which was right about what I expected. Normally I don’t have much of a preconceived notion of a place, even a famous place, but this felt impossible with Rome. Stuffed in equal parts with tourists and ancient things, it was an exhausting pleasure to wander around. Besides the obvious big monuments, I think we most enjoyed the neighborhood across the Tiber, home to eccentric buskers and lovely small squares, and late night ice cream at the busiest shop in town.

From there it was off to the sea side to rest and recuperate, which meant a lovely three days in the still-quiet Rimini, apparently one of Italy’s premier beach/club destinations. At this time of year it was still very quiet, so we enjoyed having plenty of space on the beach, zipping around the almost entirely flat old town on borrowed bikes, and a day trip to the third-smallest country in Europe (and we already did the Vatican, which leaves only Monaco), San Marino. The clouds stayed away for this trip, fortunately; though the city is an interestingly and well-preserved fortress, the real pleasure of the trip was the view. San Marino is basically a country that is also a large hill, surrounded by plains leading to the sea on one side, and craggy foothills on the other. The old walls are climbable, and the view over the new city and off into the various distances was fantastic.

And then a long and complex train ride to Trieste, Italy’s eastern outpost, nearly surrounded by Slovenia and ruled for much of its existence by the Austro-Hungarian empire, it definitely feels different. They still love their gelato, but food tends more towards ham and horseradish than pasta, and the buildings and city have a decidedly Germanic feel. The town is lovely though, all the old Viennese style apartment buildings painted in pastels with white trim, and the sea never far away. We’re staying with an old friend of mine, who’s natural hospitality is enhanced by the loveliness of her apartment, a fantastic and fantastically well-maintained antique with huge and detailed ceilings and a complicated 12-foot door leading to a wonderful balcony. And this is just her room. Anyway, it’s been a lovely stay filled with good people and good conversations, but as time winds down, we feel the need to press on. Tomorrow will see us picking up a car in Croatia for ten days that will hopefully be filled with wild camping and windy roads, including a dip into Montenegro for some real hikes.

That will have to do for a quick summary. Hopefully my memory holds long enough to flesh out some details.

*I’m aware that there’s a bunch of Australia to the west, and moving vertically along the east coast couldn’t technically count as halfway across, but I assume Australia’s west is akin to Canada’s north, in that 4/5ths of the country doesn’t count.

Coming to you from the achingly slow connection at a fancy pants Italian cafe in the rather incredibly preserved medieval town of Lucca. Not sure where I left off, so, from Athens we took a bus across the country, and, after spending a hateful couple of hours in the pouring rain following uncertain directions, outdated guidebook advice, and nonexistent signs to a series of ferry terminals, managed to board the 30-something hour ferry towards Venice. This ride passed surprisingly quickly, and left us under clearing skies in Venice’s small port. After riding the much-signed People Mover tram for approximately 40 seconds towards town, we hopped off and navigated to our hostel. The rest of the day was spent wandering Venice’s unreasonably attractive alleys and by-ways, taking far too many photos. Highlights included all of it, though the Piazza San Marco can’t help but overwhelm.

But that’s all ancient history – the recent past and future is entirely occupied by our occupation of a wonderful old house perched atop a ridge above and between a triangle of fantastically quaint little Tuscan villages, backgrounded in all directions by snow-capped mountains. This house, owned by Kate’s grandparents, appears to be ours until we get bored, and stocked as it is with books of hikes and sights and things to do in the area, this date is rapidly receding into the future. We’ve just pushed back our leaving date from Thursday to Tuesday, to give us time to see a fantastic sounding cave, and lounge in front of the fire a bit more.

Already we’ve wandered the steep and quiet streets of old Barga, topped by a beautiful cathedral, hiked up to Tiglio Alto, the clutch of houses and small churches that overlooks the village from the opposite side as the house, and which perches, from our vantage point, so picturesquely in front of a lovely mountain. Today’s adventure was Lucca, much larger but with a charm all its own, all cobble and magnificent churches, and gently curving streets lined by towering brick houses.

Must run, as there’s more wine to buy and dinner to cook, as well as a little yardwork to do to earn our keep. The house’s one failing is its total lack of telecommunication equipment, so further updates are on hold until we get to Florence. Between now and then, there’s much lazing in the sun feasting on salami and beer, and huddling by the fire eating something from one of the many fine cookbooks.

The story resumes, a few days behind already, in the port town of Çeşme on the western edge of Turkey’s Aegean coast, where we find our intrepid heroes soaked to the bone from a five minute walk between the morning dessert café and the afternoon tea café, where they will while away an unproductive afternoon watching the clouds clear and waiting for a ferry to the Greek island of Kios/Çios/Chios/Xhios/Hios. Continue reading →

I could wax on for some time about how I already miss the Balkans (good times, very good times) but no sense lamenting when there’s so much to celebrate. Istanbul provided a wonderfully sunny welcome, though by now we appear to have worn out that particular good grace. I’ve spent the week reacquainting myself with the many delights of Turkish cuisine, and having the enjoyably role-reversed experience of playing tour guide for Kate and, for a day, Jamie. We’ve had plenty of new adventures too – two heads are better than one when it comes to finding fun in a city as overwhelming as Istanbul.

And overwhelming is the word for it. After two nights near Taksim, the bouncing, throbbing heart of new Istanbul, we fled across the continental divide to Kadikoy, still my favourite place in the city. Taksim area is absolutely stuffed with bars, clubs, and a rainbow of other drinking and shopping establishments. Twice we wandered its cacophonous streets looking for a drink and a song, and twice there were simply too many choices. Why stop and hear this particular guitarist when there’s four more just down the street? And what’s that around the corner? And what about that place we passed in the beginning that looked so cool? I’m hopeless in these situations, and Kadikoy has proved the perfect cure. Still many, many choices, but Kadikoy is too cool to thrust everything at you in a bombast of touting and overlapping music. Kadikoy is all about discreet signs, small clubs under low overhangs, and not being able to find the place you’re looking for because it doesn’t appear to have a sign at all. We ended up in converted house, the bar taking up the top two floors, plus the small attic, which is where they stashed the band. We’d never have known it from the street, but they put on quite a show in the tiny room, well worth staying through the heat.

Even the relative calm of Kadikoy is still Istanbul, though, and I’m looking forward to starting the journey south and spending some time outside. The forecast is for thunderstorms tonight, so we’ve delayed our departure by a day to try and wait out the worst of it, but we’re heading to one of the Prince’s Islands tonight, which should provide a nice city break. And a good excuse to spend more time on the always-relaxing public transit ferries (they’re not Brisbane’s high-speed cats, Carmen, but they’re still heaps fun).

Also: Saw a dolphin! In the Golden Horn. Turns out there are dolphins in this tiny strip of hyper-trafficked water? Would not have guessed, but there you are. The Horn was also full of jellyfish – millions and millions of them, mostly alive and glowing phosphorescent. A beautiful sight present at every bridge and ferry crossing.

Returning to Turkey, especially at night, was like returning to the west. From a ragged, barely two-lane road in Bulgaria (which I’m convinced cannot be the main road to Turkey) we crossed the border and spent the next few hours on a beautifully smooth six-lane highway, filled with long-haul trucks carrying everything a first world country needs, from Sony products to biodiesel. Continue reading →

With word from my once and future travel partner Kate that she’d like to head to Turkey ASAP to beat the heat, Sarajevo became the westernmost stop on this particular leg of the journey. The coast was still calling, and Dubrovnik is marginally closer to Turkey than Sarajevo (this is possibly untrue), so off I went. Continue reading →

I’ll have to do a backdated post on Dubrovnik’s undeniable charm, but first. The drive to Kotor, Montenegro. It started with one of the very few tense moments I’ve had while driving. Aboard the short, tall bus (the kind that seem inherently unstable), I looked down at the beautiful blue of the Adriatic, with nothing but a guardrail that didn’t even begin to reach the bottom of my feet and 300-odd meters of sheer cliff separating us. Incredible view, but the rocking, brake-burning pace that the driver set was not particularly confidence inspiring. For the first time in my life, I wished I knew more engineering physics, so I could calculate more precisely when the brakes would fail, and how far we’d sail over the edge, and other related details. Sadly, this didn’t last, and the drive morphed into a mostly pretty cruise beside fertile valleys and adorable little terracotta roofed villages at the feet of small, grey mountains, it became something else entirely when we reached the bay. Though I’ve also heard it referred to as a Gulf, which seems much more appropriate. It took a solid hour to wend our way around the nooks and crannies of the water, and Kotor is not that close to the far side. But what an hour. Continue reading →